Tarmac Delays (PLG1)

A few isolated incidents involving air carrier irregular operations have necessitated governmental
intervention into the area of passengers’ rights. Occasionally, situations can arise where ground
(tarmac) delays occur either before takeoff or after landing. Takeoff delays could be caused by
severe weather in the departure area or air traffic congestion, while delays after landing are
usually a result of ramp congestion and/or poor gate utilization. Because of a few extreme cases
where passengers have been “trapped” on an aircraft for hours on the ground, the FAA
developed rules that airlines must follow in the event that an extended tarmac delay occurs.
Airlines guilty of violating those rules face very stiff penalties in the form of fines.
Read Tarmac Delays/FAA, (https://www.transportation.gov/individuals/aviation-consumerprotection/tarmac-delays) and then review the associated 14 CFR rules at Electronic Code of
Federal Regulations/Government Publishing Office. (https://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text-idx?
SID=c327ec1c760c8a98e3e37f6fb85854d1&mc=true&node=pt14.4.259&rgn=div5)
Search online, and choose one of many examples where an airline was fined for violating the
FAA’s Tarmac Delay rules. In a short paper, critically analyze the situation, and make
recommendations that might have mitigated the predicament. Your paper should start with a
recap of the circumstances that caused the delay.
Be sure to address these questions in your analysis:
Were there avoidable operational breakdowns at the OCC or the local station – or was this an
unavoidable situation?
Once involved in the delay, did the airline do anything to mitigate the impact on the passengers?
Would greater use of NextGen technologies (as described in the FAA video included in the
module resources) have improved the situation?
Your paper should conclude with your recommendations on how the situation could have been
better managed.
Your paper will include a title page, 2–3 pages of text, and a reference page – all APA formatted.
An abstract and table of contents are not needed for a paper this short.
Your paper will automatically be evaluated through Turnitin when you submit your assignment in
this activity. Turnitin is a service that checks your work for improper citation or potential
plagiarism by comparing it against a database of web pages, student papers, and articles from
academic books and publications. Ensure that your work is entirely your own and that you have
not plagiarized any material!
Save your assignment using a naming convention that includes your first and last name and the
activity number (or description). Do not add punctuation or special characters.
Overview
Busy tarmac with many planes.Air carrier operations involve some of the most complex
processes in the world and connect over 20,000 city-pairs worldwide – that’s double the service
that was available just 24 years ago. Worldwide annual passenger numbers have exceeded 4
billion per year and continue to grow, especially in countries like China where aviation is seeing
record growth. Maintaining normal operations at an airline is not an easy task, especially when
there are numerous areas of vulnerability. In this module, we will study normal air carrier
operations – how the job gets done day in and day out. We will also analyze various problems
that can disrupt the normally smooth-flowing system and look into areas where carriers are most
vulnerable to disruption. A carrier’s ability to work around an irregularity and return to normal
operations as soon as possible is crucial to their operation and, hence, their profitability
Module Objectives
Upon successful completion of this module, you will be able to:
Recognize why air carriers are vulnerable to upsets. (LO 3)
Describe various methods air carriers can use to return to normal operations after an upset to
their system. (LO 3)
Critically analyze unfamiliar material in the area of air transportation. (LO 8)
Demonstrate appropriate selection and application of a research method. (LO 9)
Prepare written reports in the required format. (LO 9)